This is a response to a question in Anna M's diary from yesterday,
Please Make it Stop. Originally, this was going to be a comment, but I got rolling and figured I might as well burn a diary entry on it.
The question is, "Where is this generation's youth rebellion?"
I thought I'd try to answer. Judging by the length of this diary, I am a moron.
First, since this is a 2000+ word diary about student activism, here are my creds. I did
this, started
this, where I organized
this and
this, and did
this, helped out with
this, did
this, while writing and recording stuff like
this. So I've kind of been around the block trying to get young people to do shit. I've generally failed. That's mostly my fault, for being a rookie leader and all, but even if I would have known what the hell I was doing, I still would have faced an uphill battle to get people engaged. This diary is an attempt to explain why the slope is so steep.
Plain and simple: most of this generation just isn't passionate about changing the world. I've given this issue a lot of thought, and posted this diary a few months ago, when I experienced a series of epiphanies that basically caused me to knock my ideals down a few notches. And here's my disclaimer: PLENTY of good student activism IS going on. You just don't hear much about it, and a lot of it is locally based. Furthermore, young people voted strongly against Bush BOTH times. That being said, we're definitely not as active as the young people during the Vietnam era, and it's a problem worth looking into. At the very least, I think our inactivism is a good indicator of other problems plaguing American society.
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So here's a partial list of reasons my generation hasn't directly confronted Bush the way the `60s generation confronted LBJ and Nixon... feel free to pick and choose the ones you like.
A. COMFORT
1. We are not being drafted. No one is forcing us to die. Every kid who gets killed in Iraq signed up. So we're sorry they're dead, but we're not scared of being next. Not yet, at least.
2. We have not lived through a crisis... or, at least, the media has not had the presence of mind to explain to us that the status quo of the world is itself a crisis. Some of us have figured this out, and that's why we're here. Most of us are not here, though.
3. We have less time. This is party because of the wide range of very attractive leisure options afforded to us by new technology. We have video games. We can go to the mall. We can get wasted. We can sit around the house on MySpace all day. Facebook is a timekiller. And AIM. YouTube. We can watch TV. We have cable... there's always something on. The hippies didn't have cable. As far as I know, they had books, sex, drugs, conversation, and basic television to entertain them. If they would have had endless Law and Order reruns (amazingly addictive) and constant instant access to MySpace to pacify them, there's no way they would have had Woodstock. We have DVDs... we can watch a movie ANYTIME we want. This means less time spent thinking (read: less time becoming informed and involved citizens). Why would I go to a protest when I have 500 channels and a whole notebook of pirated NetFlix DVDs to choose from? No time for protesting! Unless they take away my right (or ability) to download music.
4. We're as lazy as the rest of America. And we have a whole corporate machine catering to our laziness. Fast food, iPods, Starbucks, pop music, nice clothes, fancy cars, slick movies, strip malls, sports, suburbs, and beer. And every product has an advertisement permanently tattooed into our brains.
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B. CULTURE
1. Our popular culture is not producing enough artists, authors, or musicians who provoke or challenge us to take drastic actions... the most politically active pop artist out there is U2. This is pitiful. The effect is that we have no one feeding mainstream kids with the fuel they need to rock the boat. Subcultures like punk and rap are still plugging along and there are definitely some well-intentioned people in the public eye (Angelina Jolie, Jon Stewart, Billy Joe Armstrong, and Jello Biafra come to mind), but they're powerless in the face of massive corporate machines that control so many aspects of our lives.
2. MTV and shallow music culture continues to discourage free, radical, and non-narcissistic thought. Despite their annoying and disingenuous attempts to prove otherwise, MTV is incredibly debilitating because they perpetuate the music industry's love affair with the status quo; they are the key cog in the corporate image production machine right now, trotting out mediocre and inane pop songs that stagnate minds. MTV is one of the root causes of apathy.
3. Pop culture slaps negative labels on young people who DO attempt to conduct activism, branding them as boring, self-righteous, goody-goody, dorky, lame, annoying, etc... so this puts a psychological roadblock in front of activism, making it harder to gain recruits, harder to maintain group momentum, harder to get people to aim for higher goals. It's hard to be confident and idealistic when the whole system seems to be mocking you. See sections C2 and C4.
4. Rich suburban white kids don't feel like sacrificing their time for ideals, because many of them don't have ideals. To have ideals, one usually has to be inspired, and we have never been inspired by anyone involved in politics; in fact, we have been repeatedly discouraged by our leaders (see all of section D). The white kids during the `60s did cool stuff like freedom rides and protests. The white kids of the `00s have cool things like PS2's and Family Guy.
5. We have no iconic leaders. I don't know if this is a result or a cause of our problems. My guess would be to say that it's both; like many of the reasons on this list, it's a catch-22. Now, obviously, we have many good leaders (see B1), but there's no one with quite enough power to move enough people to start a groundswell.
5a. If only Rage Against the Machine had held together for FIVE more years!!! If only Immortal Technique was playing on every hip-hop radio station in the United States!
6. We have more expenses. Movies, cable TV, Internet, computers, clothes, gas, cars, food, rent... everything's expensive. And we neeeeeeeed all this stuff. Supposedly.
7. For most, material well-being is valued far more than spiritual well-being. Most of us are willingly working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. But we spend all our time being bombarded with information telling us that we really do need all of this shit. Our minds are owned. Most people never suppress materialism enough to allow them to free up the sheer amount of time it takes to actually critically think about what's going on in the world, let alone to research it out, and develop and implement heavy solutions. It's so much easier to just go with the flow and hope for the best. "Bush sucks, but ya know, the Democrats will figure it out and take care of it somehow and it'll all be ok."
8. We seem to use drugs for different reasons than the hippies did. "Expand your mind, maaaaaaan!" has generally been replaced with, "Dude, let's get fuckin' trashed tonight!" Interestingly, this is the only reason on the list that I can somewhat closely link to every other reason on the list.
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C. COLLEGE
1. College students nowadays have to pay more to attend major universities... so you pretty much HAVE to work if you're going to keep up with tuition/expenses. It's hard to work, go to school, AND be an activist. For most people, sleep > activism.
2. Some students view college activists as cliche and annoying, an invasion of their space... for some, this is rooted in the fact that we're superficial and used to being sheltered. Others have just been conditioned with a South Park conservative knee jerk hatred for people they suspect might hold liberal beliefs. These are the people who disturb me the most, because they're the ones whose ideals have been broken beyond all possibility of repair; these are the people glare at you and tear up the fliers you hand them. They are what I call "hostile apathetics" and they make up a sizable portion of the student population. What I really don't like about them is that they intimidate good people; a lot of activists in orgs I've been involved with don't like tabling because of the mean people who don't like getting handed fliers.
3. Some students are too busy to even listen, stemming from the fact that they are working 40 hours a week and holding down a full load of classes and really just don't give a fuck about what Bush is doing, and resent the fact that they've been handed a flier telling them all about it. I don't blame them.
4. The media insulates us from real world events, instead showing us shiny objects... so most young'uns know more about Paris Hilton than Darfur... again, we've been sheltered (see A1, A2). This is partly our fault, but the corporations get blame points for being such eager and greedy enablers... and for crafting the culture that perpetuates this dangerous bit of apathy.
5. Many campus administrations are resistant to activism. UC Santa Barbara: administration has regulations that allow them to fine or dissolve student groups who put up fliers in non-designated places. UC San Diego: students cannot technically even table without submitting forms to administration; "unregistered" groups are not allowed to table. Most (all?) campuses charge student groups a fee to "register" officially. Having bureaucracies regulating student activism is a royal pain in the ass, and and stifles our freedom of speech and assembly. The LAST thing we need as young, inexperienced activists are red tape roadblocks.
6. Kids have been conditioned so that they care more about grades and resumes than ideals and social justice. There are some very intelligent apathetic people at some campuses. Berkeley immediately springs to mind; my best friend goes there and he's always telling me how much it depresses him that "no one does anything anymore" and that the reputation the school built up during the `60s has been ruined by GPA-obsessed life-apathetic nerds; some people go there now expecting to find radical activism and instead encounter absolute and total lameness and arrogance-laced apathy. People are would rather get an A on their next midterm than stop the war. I believe that the elite campuses, by focusing so much on GPA and test scores in their admissions policies, have been hit harder by this factor.
7. Of the activism that does go on at elite campuses, a solid proportion is carried out by ambitious shitheads who don't really give a fuck about anything, but are very eager to put nice titles on their resumes. Basically, there are whores out there, and they make it harder to organize because they are not willing to take risks. My bitter little May 1st diary, No Future, focuses on this aspect of the student activism obstacle course. This problem relates to sections A4, B4, and B5.
8. It's hard to raise money. And to get anything done in America in 2006, you NEED money. Like, A LOT (see Section D4). We don't have that kind of firepower, and the sources who DO offer funding don't like the kind of projects that rock the boat.
9. Some fine student activism DOES go on at college campuses, but it is often locally focused. For example, when Students for Impeachment tried to get some antiwar people at UC Santa Cruz to help set up a chapter, they responded by saying that they didn't feel we had any chance at influencing national issues, and that they wanted to focus on local actions, like counter-recruitment, instead. The sad truth is that most people feel incredibly disempowered and timid when you ask them to do something about the jerks in D.C. They think it's crazy to even think of launching a direct attack on the status quo in filthy, detached, money-driven, arrogance-laden, faraway Washington. Which takes me to our next culprit...
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D. WASHINGTON
1. The political establishment's ability to manipulate ordinary Americans has made young people feel timid, powerless, and overwhelmed... how in the hell are a few passionate college students ever going to accomplish any democracy-saving feats if the American people really are as stupid, naïve, and self-destructive as they've clearly demonstrated? We don't have Rovian firepower.
2. We grew up during the Clinton years; therefore we have no faith in politicians. Right AND Left... As far as we've heard, both sides are hypocritical jerks who don't give a shit about anything that matters, but who will eagerly lie to you about anything. Notably, we've also spent our entire lifetimes watching negative attacks and ads launched by both sides of the political spectrum, in election after election, and have therefore developed an aversion to ideological conviction, since everyone who claims to believe in anything is apparently a no-good hypocrite douchebag. The TV said so!
3. We recognize that politicians would rather USE us than RESPECT us. I think the 60s relationship was more like, politicians feared pissing off young people, because so many young people were outspoken, passionate, brave, and violent, whereas nowadays young people are generally afraid of taking risks that might jeopardize their future. It's easier to just do the internship and shut up and do what you're told. "I'm going to change the system from within!" they say. Deep down, I think a lot of them understand that they're becoming cogs, and it contributes to a general sense of apprehension I've detected in many of the politically active students I've met.
4. We recognize that there is so much money flowing in Washington today that we could riot at every campus in the U.S. for a month, and we would still have less power than one single moderately-sized lobbying firm. We're just like the rest of American citizens: we have no power. You get money the fuck out of politics, and you will see a rise in fucking student activism. Sorry for cursing, but this is an especially sore point with me. I believe this is the biggest political roadblock in the world right now, as you can look at just about any problem facing America and it's origins can be traced back to the Beltway cash orgy.
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Bottom line: trying to spark a youth protest movement in the U.S. is like trying to light a match underwater.
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So there ya have it. I think all of these reasons combined pretty much account why there has yet to be a sustained youth-based college-led anti-Bush movement in the country. I've tried to find a middle ground between depth and readability here, so some of the points aren't as thoroughly explained as I'd like. And there are definitely other points that I've completely missed. I think this is a pretty good start, tho.
I'd like to provide some possible solutions, but this diary is already way too long. Maybe some other day. Thanks for reading--if anyone reads this--and I'll leave you with one of the defining quotes of the 1990s. Tyler Durden speaking to a crowd of people who are about to voluntarily beat the living shit out of each other.
Look around and I see a lot of new faces. [Rumble from the crowd] Shut up! Which means a lot of you have been breaking the first two rules of Fight Club. Man, I see in Fight Club the strongest and smartest men who have ever lived. I see all this potential -- damn it, an entire generation pumping gas and waiting tables; they're slaves with white collars. Advertisements have them chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We are the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no great war, or great depression. Our great war is a spiritual war. Our great depression is our lives. We've all been raised by television to believe that one day we'll all be millionaires and movie gods and rock stars -- but we won't. And we're learning slowly that fact. And we're very, very pissed off.
But we aint got no Tyler Durden.